First time I heard that last
hymn sung was on a CD. It was made by Maurice Montgomery's
sister, Amy. I forget her name, but she played
the piano at the church there where Don Fortner pastored Grace
Baptist Church in Danville for many years. I liked that hymn. There'll be
no more valleys. If you will, now let's turn in
our Bibles to 1 Samuel chapter 7. We saw last week, we looked in
chapter 6, and we saw how that the Lord wrought a miracle and
causing those two milk cows, who had never been connected
to pull a cart before, leaving their nursing calves and bringing
the Ark of the Covenant back into the land of Israel. And
they brought the Ark to a city or town called Beth Shemesh. And the men of Beth Shemesh,
they were out in their fields working when they saw the cart
coming and the Ark of the Covenant, and they rejoiced. And we saw
how that they took the cows and offered them as a sacrifice,
used the cart to burn the fire. And then God killed several of
the men in Beth Shemesh. He killed them for looking in
to the Ark of the Covenant. And we have a picture there of
man, sinful man, exposed to the holiness of God, the holy law
of God, without a mediator between. And God killed them. And they immediately asked the
men of Kirjath-Jerim to come and take the ark. And that's
how our chapter begins tonight, if you notice in verse one, and
the men of Kirjath-Jerim came and fetched up the ark of the
Lord. Now I hope that I was not misunderstood
last week when dealing with the number of men the scripture says
that God killed. If you look back into chapter
six, verse 19, the scripture here reads, and he smote the
men of Beth Shemesh because they had looked into the ark of the
Lord. Even he smote of the people 50,000
and three score and 10 men. Now, I want to make sure that
no one misunderstood. I wasn't saying, or I did not
mean to imply, that I do not believe the scripture, because
I do, and I never want to say anything in any way that would
hint, at least, that I do not believe the scripture is accurate,
that it is the inspired word of God. But I was pointing out
that this town of Beth Shemesh was not a largely populated town. And when we read here that God
killed 50,070 men, and it happened on the same day, the very same
day that the Ark of the Covenant came back into the land of Israel. It seems like it would be impossible
for 50,000 people to gather there that quickly. And so what I was
pointing out is that this text may be read where it shows that
God killed 70,000, 50, 70, I'll get it right here in a minute,
70 men of Beth Shemesh. the 50,000, and if you notice
the text again there in verse 19 of chapter 6, and he smote
the men of Beth Shemesh because they had looked into the ark
of the Lord. Now notice, even he smote of
the people. You see the difference? He smote
the men of Beth Shemesh and he smote of the people, 50,000. I believe that And it can be read like this,
that it was 70 men of Beth Shemesh that the Lord killed. There was
50,000 men who were killed when the ark was in the land of the
Philistines. The Lord, we saw, his hand was
heavy upon them. God's judgment was upon them.
So I believe the 50,000 who were slain were those of the Philistines. Tonight, as we look in chapter
seven, I want to point five things out to us in this chapter. And
I trust the Lord will bless these things to all of us. First, the
great failure of Israel to obey the law. Let's read verses one
and two. And the men of Gerim came and
fetched up the ark of the Lord. and brought it into the house
of Abinadad in the hill and sanctified Eliezer, his son, to keep the
ark of the Lord. And it came to pass while the
ark abode in Kirjath-Jerim that the time was long, for it was
20 years." I'll stop reading there. We read that the time
was long, 20 years. But that's not telling us that
the Ark of the Covenant was out of the tabernacle for only 20
years. The 20 years is speaking about
from the time that the Ark was brought back from the Philistines
until what takes place now in this chapter was 20 years. It was a long time, the scripture
says. Actually, we know that the Ark
of the Covenant remained here in Kirtjath-Jerim for over 40
years. It would remain here until David
was anointed king and brought the Ark into Jerusalem. So all
during the time of Saul's reign, the Ark of the Covenant stayed
in this place. And it was only after David was
anointed And I think it was seven years after he was anointed that
the covenant was brought, the Ark of the Covenant, rather,
was brought back or was placed in the tabernacle. And it wasn't
the tabernacle of Moses either. Remember, David set up a tabernacle
in Jerusalem, and that's where the Ark of the Lord was brought. When Israel entered the land
of promise, when they were brought into Canaan, The ark, the tabernacle,
and all of it was set up in Shiloh. And that's where Samuel's father
and mother went in the first chapter of this book of 1 Samuel. That's where they went to worship
the Lord, was to Shiloh. That's where Eli told Hannah
that the Lord would answer her prayer. And that's where Hannah
took Samuel and presented him to the Lord in Shiloh. But in
Psalm 78, we read this, that Israel provoked God with their
images, and he forsook the tabernacle of Shiloh. From that point on, when the
ark was taken by the Philistines into their country until now,
The Ark of the Covenant never was back in the tabernacle of
Moses. It never was. But let's just
take the 20 years that this text mentions. That means for 20 years,
for 20 years they could not have observed the Day of Atonement.
You know, I think sometimes we have the idea that God gave His
law, and the nation of Israel, they obeyed that law all through
the Old Testament history. But that's not so. That's not
so. For 20 years, at least, they
could not observe the Great Day of Atonement. Why? Because the
Ark of the Covenant was not in the Holy of Holies. It was here
in Kirgeth Jireh. The tabernacle was in Shiloh,
and the Ark of the Lord was in this man's house here in Kirjath-Jerim. For 20 years, think about this,
for 20 years, there had been no blood sprinkled on the mercy
seat or before the mercy seat. Actually longer than that, but
at least these 20 years, there had been no high priest taking
the blood of that goat into the most holy place and sprinkling
it on the mercy seat and before the mercy seat. Now I bring this
up, I said my first point is the great failure, the great
failure of the nation of Israel to obey the law of God. It's foolish for people to think
that they're going to be saved by keeping the law. The nation
of Israel, they never even obeyed the word of God that God had given
through Moses in how they were to conduct the ceremonial part
of the law. Now we know that the ceremonial
part of the law is the way that the gospel was manifested. It was through those animals,
through those sacrifices that were offered daily and yearly
and as as men would bring an offering unto the Lord. Picturing,
of course, the Lord Jesus Christ, God's one and only effectual
sacrifice to put away sin. They failed, they failed. And
anyone and everyone who believes or thinks that somehow by the
law, the covenant that God gave to Moses, that they're going
to satisfy God, Man cannot keep that law, never did keep it,
never has kept it. So that's the first thing we
see, the great failure. You see that, don't you? I mean,
that's very obvious. 20 years, at least 20 years,
the Ark of the Covenant was here, the tabernacle was over here
in Shiloh. There was no way they could obey
that law concerning the Day of Atonement. No blood, no blood
ever was sprinkled on for at least those 20 years. No blood
was ever sprinkled on the mercy seat. The second thing I want us to
see is a great awakening. Now we've all heard of great
awakenings, the first great awakening, the second great awakening, but
this is a great awakening here and you can read over it and
never see it. You can read over it and never really dawn on you
what is said here. But notice the last few words
of verse two. And all the house of Israel lamented
after the Lord. Now, the word all, I don't think
probably it includes every single solitary Israelite, of course,
but the majority, the majority of the nation here now All the
house of Israel lamented after the Lord. And Samuel spake unto
all the house of Israel, saying, If you do return unto the Lord
with all your hearts, then put away the strange gods and Asheroth
from among you, and prepare your hearts unto the Lord, and serve
him only, and he will deliver you out of the hand of the Lord. Then the children of Israel did
put away Balaam and Astaroth and served the Lord only." Robert
Hawker made this comment on this text, this passage, which says,
all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord. And I quote,
No doubt the Lord poured out of His Holy Spirit upon Israel.
And then Israel felt the sweet influences of His grace. And
one of the old writers commented that the only likeness, the only
likeness we have to this in the Word of God is the day of Pentecost. The day of Pentecost when God
poured out His Spirit upon the church there. And when God poured
out His Spirit on the day of Pentecost, what happened? What
took place? Well, first of all, Peter, along
with the other disciples, they stood up to preach. And that's
what we see Samuel did. Notice that. And all the house
of Israel lamented after the Lord. No doubt, as Hawker said,
God had poured out His Spirit upon the nation. The next thing
we read, Samuel spake unto all the house of Israel. If you look
at the end of verse six. We read, and Samuel judged the
children of Israel in misfit. What does it mean when we read
that Samuel judged Israel or others judged Israel? Well, we
know it has reference to civil matters, no doubt. There were
matters that were brought before the prophets who served sometimes
as judges and the judges in the book of judges. But I want you
to look at a few verses with me that reveal to us what that
means when we read that Samuel judged Israel, is that he taught
them the word of God. He explained to them the law
of God. He preached to them the word
of the Lord. Look back with me in chapter
18 of Exodus. And this is Moses. explaining
to his father-in-law how he served as a judge. In Exodus chapter
18. And verse 16. Now Moses, let's read
verse 15. And Moses said unto his father-in-law,
because the people come unto me to inquire of God. When they
have a matter, they come unto me, and I judge between one and
another, and I do make them know the statutes of God and his laws. You see what it meant to judge
Israel? It was to make them to know the
statutes of God and his laws. In other words, to preach, to
preach the word of God. Now, compared to us today, They
had a very small portion of the word of God, didn't they? But
it was still the law of God. The law of God is perfect, converting
the soul, the psalmist said in Psalm 19. Look with me at another
place in the book of Ezekiel. We're over here in Ezekiel chapter
20. Verse four, we read, Wilt thou
judge them, son of man? Wilt thou judge them? What does
that mean? Cause them to know the abominations
of their fathers. Judge them, judge them. Cause them to know the abominations
of their fathers. All right, look in chapter, 22
also of Ezekiel, chapter 22 and verse 2. Now, chapter 22 of Ezekiel, verse
2. Now thou son of man, wilt thou
judge? Wilt thou judge the bloody city?
Yea, thou shalt show her all her abominations. When the spirit
of God was poured out upon the nation of Israel, The scripture
says that all the house of Israel lamented after the Lord, then
Samuel judged them. He preached, he taught them the
word of God, caused them to know their iniquities. And of course
he told them, he preached and taught Israel to know their sin,
to put away their gods. male gods, and that's with a
small g, g-o-d-s, not a capital, they had male gods and they had
female deities that they worshiped. And Samuel tells them to put
them away, all of them. Put away the strange gods and
Ashtaroth from among you. And then in verse four, then
the children of Israel did put away Balaam, that's a male deity,
and Ashtaroth, a female deity. Put them away. The point I really
want to make here is this, that this is a heart word. What Samuel
is exhorting them to is a heart work in verse three. And Samuel spake unto all the
house of Israel, saying, if you do, return unto the Lord with
all your hearts. You know, it's easy, relatively
easy, to do outward things. But God looks at the heart. With
the heart man believeth unto righteousness. True religion,
if I can use that in a good sense, true religion is heart religion. And the heart involves what our
intellect, our volition, our will, and our affections. That's what the scripture means
when it speaks about the heart, our understanding, our affections,
and our volition, our will. It's a heart work. Later in the
Old Testament, the prophet Joel, speaking to the nation, said,
rend your heart. Rend your heart and not your
garments. That's the way they showed they
were in repentance, or they would rend their garments. But it's
easy to rend your garments, tear your garments. But that's outward. But the matter is the heart. With the heart man believeth
unto righteousness, with the mouth confession is made unto
salvation. Rend your heart and not your
garments, Joel said, and turn unto the Lord your God, for he
is gracious and merciful, slow to anger, and of great kindness. What a promise, right? What a
promise he gave when he was preaching. Rend your heart. And you say,
well, I can't rent my heart. No, that's it. You can't. Only
God can. Only God can. We're commanded
to. You say, well, if we're commanded
to it, we must have the ability. No, no, that's not so. That's
not true. No, it's a heart work, just like
the scripture in the Old Testament speaks of circumcise your heart. Man cannot circumcise his heart.
What is that? That's a new birth. That's a
work of the spirit of God. That's so important that it be
a hard work. The third thing, the great public
worship service. I see that in verses five and
six. So we've seen the failure, the great failure of Israel to
keep the law. And we've seen a great awakening
when God poured out his spirit and third, I see the great public
worship service in verses 5 and 6. And Samuel said, gather all
Israel to Mizpah, and I will pray for you unto the Lord. And
they gathered together to Mizpah. and drew water, and poured it
out before the Lord, and fasted on that day, and said, We have
sinned against the Lord. And Samuel judged, preached,
taught the children of Israel at Mesma." You see, in those
verses, when they gather together, there's four things that are
mentioned. First of all, prayer. Prayer. They called upon God. They sought the Lord. And second,
the pouring out of water. And they fasted on that day.
They afflicted their souls and their confession. You say, what
does the pouring out of the water? What is that? It was symbolic. It was symbolic. Just like if
you had a pitcher here tonight and you poured it out, if we
were outside especially, you poured out on the ground, It
showed that they had made a complete break. The water's gone. It cannot
be regathered into that pitcher. Once it's poured out, it's gone.
It's gone from that pitcher. And what the pouring out of water,
it was symbolic of showing they'd made a clean, clean cut from
their idols. They'd turned from their idols. They'd done away. They'd destroyed
their idols. and that was symbolic and showed
that by the pouring out of the water. A clean break from idolatry. Now the fourth thing is the great
typical sacrifice was offered, beginning with verse seven. And
when the Philistines heard that the children of Israel were gathered
together to Mizpah, now remember, Samson was the last judge in
the book of Judges that we read about. And the Philistines, remember,
they had captured him. In fact, they put out his eyes.
And he, of course, pulled those those posts that held the temple
up and destroyed many of the Philistines, but they had, from
that time, they had been under the rule of the Philistines.
And we saw that's how the Ark of the Covenant was captured.
The Philistines defeated them in battle. Now, they gathered
together at Mizpah. We read this in verse seven.
And when the Philistines heard of it, The lords of the Philistines
went up against Israel. They just assumed they were gathering
together. That is, Israel, they've gathered
together to worship. They gathered together to worship,
to seek the Lord. But their captors, the Philistines,
they assume, no, they've gathered together to rebel. They're going
to raise an army and they are going to rebel and try to overthrow
us, deliver themselves out of our power. And when the Philistines
heard that the children of Israel were gathered together at Mishpah,
the lords of the Philistines went up against Israel. They
raised an army and come against Israel immediately. No way we're
going to allow these Israelites to get loose, to be free. They served us all these years.
They're going to continue to serve us. So they come against
Israel and look at the children of Israel. When they heard, they
were afraid of the Philistines. And no doubt they had reason
to be afraid if they were confiding or trusting in their own ability. They probably had very few weapons,
if any, because that's one thing these armies, the conquering
armies, would do. They would take all the swords
and and other things they used to fight with, they'd take them
away from their captives so they couldn't rebel. And Israel has
very few, if any, weapons to fight the Philistines, and they're
afraid. They've been defeated by the
Philistines several times before this, and they are afraid. And the children of Israel said
to Samuel, cease not to cry unto the Lord our God for us, that
he will save us out of the hand of the Philistines. Well, he
had been praying for him. He had been praying for Israel.
He wasn't going to stop, but they expressed their desire,
right? Pray for us, pray for us. You
know, one of the things of a pastor, To preach the gospel, I think,
is first of all, but to pray for the people, to pray for those
that are in the congregation that you pastor. Very important
part of the work of a pastor, to pray. And I try to pray for
the people that come here, members here, but sometimes I'll forget
someone. I pray and then I'll be somewhere
else and I'll think, I forgot to pray for so-and-so. Forgot
to mention them in my prayer. And then I always remember, thank
God, we have an intercessor. We have an advocate with the
Father who never forgets. He never forgets one of his own,
does he? Well, Samuel prayed. He prayed
for the people, cried unto the Lord, but he also Took a lamb,
the scripture here says, took a sucking lamb. Now the lamb
would have to be at least eight days old, according to the law. But it was a small lamb that
he took and offered it for a burnt offering, holy unto the Lord. What a picture. The lamb is of
the Lord Jesus Christ, isn't it? Offered it holy, this lamb
Samuel did, unto the Lord. A burnt offering. That's what
the burnt offering pictured, wasn't it? Everything was burnt. Said offering, not everything
was burnt on the altar, but a burnt offering, everything was burnt,
showing the complete dedication of the Lord Jesus Christ to his
Father, to do the will of God. And they offered this lamb as
a sacrifice, and Samuel cried unto the Lord for Israel, And
the Lord heard him. Doesn't he always hear us when
we pray to him? Through the Lamb, through Christ. He is a mediator between us and
the Father. We ask in his name. And as Samuel
was offering up the burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to
battle against Israel. Now notice this, but the Lord
thundered. I pointed out the Israelites
had very few weapons of their own. God had, God has plenty
of weapons. And just with this thunder, this
thunder, a few weeks ago I was here at the office and I mean,
it sounded a thunder so loud it actually, man, was that an
explosion? I mean, that thunder sometimes
can get loud, can't it? And when God thundered, and this
is interesting, if you look back to 1 Samuel 2, when Hannah here prayed and sang
her hymn, in verse 10, she prophesied of this. In verse 10, the adversaries
of the Lord shall be broken to pieces out of heaven, notice
this, 1 Samuel 2, verse 10. Out of heaven shall he thunder
upon them. He thundered upon them. God did, just as Anna had said
in her song there. And he defeated them. As Samuel was offering up the
burnt offering, the Philistines drew near to battle against Israel.
But the Lord thundered with a great thunder on that day upon the
Philistines. and discomfited them, and they
were smitten. They were already smitten before
the Israelites ever came out of the house. Their enemy was
already defeated. Don't miss that. The Lord thundered,
and they were smitten before Israel. And the men of Israel
went out of Mizpah and pursued the Philistines and smote them
until they came unto Beth-char, probably smote them with their
own weapons, that is, the weapons of the Philistines. Now one other
thing, in verse 12, then Samuel took a stone and set it between
Mishpah and Shin, and called the name of it Ebenezer, Ebenezer,
saying, hitherto hath the Lord helped us. Ebenezer, hitherto
hath the Lord helped us. We sing that hymn, come thou
fount of every blessing. Tune my heart to sing thy praise,
thy grace. But one verse is, here I raise
mine Ebenezer. Hither by thy help I'm come,
and I hope by thy good pleasure to arrive at home. You know,
it's good that every child of God may speak and, and call mine,
mine, Ebenezer. Ebenezer. When we are overwhelmed,
and sometimes we are with a problem, when we're faced with difficulties
and, and tempted to be discouraged, and we all have days like that
and times like that, no one of God's children are exempt, ought
to be able to say, hitherto, hitherto hath the Lord helped
me. He's helped me this far, and
he's promised he's never going to leave me, he's never going
to forsake me. Brother Scott Richardson preached
here years ago, and one of the ladies in our church was having
some very difficult things in her life, And I remember he told
her, he said, this is just like a bump on the road. And I thought
about the speed bumps. You know what a speed bump is,
don't you? Now, a speed bump isn't to stop
you. It's just to slow you down. That's
all. And as a believer going through
this world, we come up on some speed bumps, don't we? It doesn't stop us, but sometimes
it just slows us down. And we need sometimes to be slowed
down and stop and think. Think about how good the Lord
has been to us thus far. Hitherto hath the Lord helped
me. He's not going to desert me now. No, he's not going to
do that. He's faithful. He's faithful,
even when we are unfaithful. Amen? All right, let's sing a
verse of a hymn.